The Institutional Library

the reader. The last paragraph on page 11, again, uiveighs against the "audacity" of men ("silly and SuPerficial " are adjectives used in the same connection) ^'[o blame women for refusing to have more than one * hild when the reason " may be" that their husbands UlVe infected them with venereal disease. Of course, <lny man who did blame any woman in such circumstances ^?uld deserve all the censure Mrs. Stopes coidd lay her ^ugue to. But surely she can see that what disturbs the Publicists " she speaks so scornfully about is the dederate and selfish refusal of motherhood by those per^ctly equipped and competent for it, not (lie involuntary erility of a diseased minority; and that exaggerations ,Sl'ch as this, and that printed at the top of page 14, eat their own object by forcing doctors to tell people lat Mrs. stop es doesn't know what she is talking about, i have taken pains to put forward this objection in ol ? ' because wc have very warmly at heart the same Ject as that which Mrs. Stopes desires to achieve?

^ctly equipped and competent for it, not (lie involuntary erility of a diseased minority; and that exaggerations ,Sl'ch as this, and that printed at the top of page 14, eat their own object by forcing doctors to tell people lat Mrs. stop es doesn't know what she is talking about, i have taken pains to put forward this objection in ol ?' because wc have very warmly at heart the same Ject as that which Mrs. Stopes desires to achieve? of ^le safeguarding of the race against the menace venereal diseases.It may be noted, in conclusion, a after consulting both the societies which are interest- S themselves jn this subject (and quarrelling violently 1 each other over it), Mrs. Stopes leans evidently yllc 1 more nearly to the Society for Prevention of e tie real Diseases than to the Council for Combating Th e Diseases of the New-born.Bale, Sons & Danielsson. 1920.y 626.Price ?2 12s.6d.net.) Hls important text-book was published in Vienna, ]ll0 , ?*ho author held a hospital appointment, a few ..18 before the war began.Pat! I1|0W have widely extended his studies in the in,.,, ?8y (>f the new-born.
We make the deduction Ie(^ above for the reason that foot-notes dated 1913, e^plained as relating to matters arising while the proofs were being read, are retained as such?not incor- porated with the general body of the text.
Dr. von Reuss draws 110 hard and fast line as to when a baby ceases to be " new-born " ; he takes the amount of development to be expected of a normal infant in the first two weeks of life as a rough criterion, and points out that some babies may not attain to this stage in a great many weeks, where others may pass it in a few days.
He makes out a good case for the intensive cultivation of this restricted corner of.the field of paediatrics, and within the limits he has chosen for himself he has undoubtedly put himself in the forefront of medical literature.His monograph is exhaustive without overloading, and scholarly without pedantry.A Teutonic love of statistics 011 every conceivable point is with him but a mild, obsession, and fortunately does not obscure his sense of clinical reality, as it does in some German text-books.
The appended bibliography is of stupendous proportions, but it is notice- able that German and Austrian authors form about 95 per cent, of those whom he has consulted.It is a little sur- prising to find him sticking to the original Crede method for the prevention of ophthalmia neonatorum, and not emphasising the importance of wiping away all secretion from the lids directly the head has been born.'For the developed condition, too, he prefers silver nitrate to the organic silver salts, which are the favourites (and, in our. opinion, rightly) in this country.Several drugs, by the way, are mentioned under proprietary names unknown here, and are consequently unidentifiable.The transla- tion is by an unnamed writer, and has been supervised by Dr. J. D. Rolleston.It is throughout idiomatic, and indeed reads better than some medical works composed in English do; whether this is to the credit more of Dr.
Rolleston or of the actual translator it is impossible to decide, but it may be guessed that the former is largely responsible.On the very first page, as it happens, there is a curious slip, whereby a case rate of 4 in 932 is de- scribed as 4.08 per cent.The illustrations are adequate without being remarkable, and there is a good index; the published price is a high one and may militate against the popularity of an excellent text-book.
The title of this little brochure is self-explanatory, and for those working upon disinfectants and bactericides the reference provided is a necessary laboratory companion.
With an arbitrary test, the need for strict observance of conditions laid down cannot be too strongly emphasised if comparative figures are to be of any real value.Granted that, in its unmodified form, this technique will not always provide complete indication of the clinical value of any given antiseptic, yet a test which, in the first place, gives a true measure of the simple germicidal efficiency is fetill of prime importance.
Intestinal Disinfection: With a Note on Its Prac- tical Attainment.By J. T. Ainslie Walker, Cantain, R.A.M.C. (T.F.). (London : The Universal Medicil Periodicals, Ltd.,  Whitefriars Street, E.C. 4. Price 6d. net.Considerable diversity of opinion exists as to the exact morbid effects of alimentary toxaemia, but there are suffi- cient well-defined clinical conditions arising therefrom to Makch 26, 19-21.The Institutional Library?(continued).make a reliable non-toxic intestinal disinfectant therapeutically invaluable.The failure of such substances as salol, /3-naphthol, calomel, salicylates, etc., is now generally realised, and we therefore read with great interest the author's claims for substances known respec- tively as trimethol (trimethylomethoxyphenol) and dimol (dimethylomethoxyphenol).The Rideal-Walker co-efficient of both lies at 35 to 40, but, so far, clinical experience gives preference to the former.The author's small brochure is very easy reading, and his experience already gained with these products suggests that they might well be given an extended trial in institutional practice.The Surgical Aspects of Dysentery.By Zachahy Cope, B.A., M.D., M.S., F.R.C.S.
(The Oxford Medical Publications, Henry Frowde, and Hodder & Stoughton.)Price 12s.6d.net.This work embodies portions of the Hunterian Lecture which originally appeared in the Lancet, and the author, as surgical specialist with the Mesopotamia^ Expeditionary Force, 1916-19, is able to speak from a great fund of ex- perience.Every big campaign produces its epidemic of dysentery, and the late war proved no exception to the rule.
Surgical complications may not, in future, be common in dysentery, with improved therapeutic measures now available.
But the large numbers of latent sub- acute and chronic post-war cases, now inevitably distri- buted in temperate as well as tropical areas, make efficient' surgical knowledge of the condition highly necessary.At present the literature of the subject is both scanty and scattered, and Mr. Cope, by clearly recording his suc- cesses, difficulties?andmistakes?withunbiased candour, has supplied an obvious need.Both lie and the publishers are to be congratulated upon the result of their respective efforts.
Text-book of Tracheo-Bronchoscopy.By Dr. M. Mann.Translated by A. R. Moodie, M.D. (Bale, Sons, and Danielsson. 1920.Pp. 291.Price 31s.6d.net.)This must be, we take it, the first translation of an important German textbook since the war, and if there are any fastidious patriots who feel inclined to sniff because the author is a German, at least let them remem- ber fas est et ab hoste (loceri.Frankly, there is no living Englishman who could, to the best of our belief., have written this book : an unpleasant thought, perhaps, but not one to be blinked.Dr. Mann's purpose goes much further than to produce an account* of how to use tracheo-bronchial illuminated tubes so as to remove foreign bodies from the air-passages, though to this subject he pays, of course, great attention.He pleads for tracheo-bronclioscopy that it is capable of an important role in the diagnosis (and occasionally in the treatment) of pulmonary and other intra-thoracic diseases.If this premise be granted?andbe produces very strong evi- dence to prove it?it is difficult to refuse assent to his deduction that the general surgeon and the general physician ought to acquire the rather complicated though not really difficult technique of tracheo-bronchoscopy instead of leaving it to a handful of laryngologists.Dr. Mann, in other words, can dive below externals down to first principles.It may be some years possibly before the profession wholly adopts his view about this, but it is to be hoped that serious consideration will be given to it in this country.Such a consummation Dr. Moodie and the publishers have done their best to promote : their parts in the task of presenting the most up-to-date developments of tracheo-bronchoscopy have been very ably played, and they deserve a special word of thanks accordingly.
Bibliophiles may be interested to note that although the page of the book is as large as that of an average quarto (indeed, larger than most of the early quartos), yet the book is technically what is called 16mo : that is, the "signature" occurs only every thirty-two pages, showing that sixteen pages are printed at the same moment by each press.
Woman.By, Magdf.leineAllen. 1921.Price 7s.6d.net.) It is nearly always a mistake to pitch expectation too high; even the Wonders of the World will barely stand the strain of over-anticipation.This mistake in tactics is committed by the publishers when they enclose Miss (or Mrs.) Marx's masterpiece in a wrapper covered with flamboyant laudations by various French (and two Eng- lisli) authors.One expects an answer to the riddle of the Sphinx : something at once profound, catholic, kindly* tender, true.And all we get is a series of anacolutho, of half-finished sentences ending in rows of dots, of half-intelligible epigrams separated by hiatuses.Perhaps that is the secret the author is letting us into?that woman is a creature only to be expressed in lost chords and'broken melodies, an irresponsible, indefinite, inconse- quent medley of half-formed ideas and half-expressed sentimentalities.If this is what Magdeleine Marx means?she apparently also means that polyandry is normal and that maternal affection is not, or is at least less so than the former; for the heroine, after losing both her husband and her paramour in the war, is left at the end of the book expressing the confident hope that presently she will another mate?whether wi th benefit of clergy or without she does not explain.Heaven forbid that any man should presume to think he understands the female of the species?that she is more deadly than the male wo liavo poetic authority for believing, and Magdeleine Marx's present ment of her suggests that this is an under-statement of t'ie For the new edition of this well-known work it '1,|S been decided to separate the text into the above t^ volumes.Apart from obviously increased care of section* reference, the two spheres dealt with have so little 1 common that students will undoubtedly approve of change, more especially as separate lecturers frequen .deal with these branches, and as they are generally stu 1 at separate times.We have previously expressed appr?^ ^ of the masterly way in which the author has carried n seemingly impossible condensation of all tho inf?rIlial^.milk.It has been written for the American philanthi'0 the Hon.

Nathan
Straus, whose distribute ^ Pasteurised milk in New York and great efforts to c impure milk dangers in the U.S.A. have earned ^ deserved commendation.The least that can be sai,al>ly his present pamphlet is that it contains some rema sound advice.